EJB 2.0 ?

[greg norman]

I got the voucher as well. But please take look at the Sun's J2EE 1.4 tutorial
http://java.sun.com/j2ee/1.4/docs/tutorial/doc/index.html
Among the total 21 chapters, only the 17th is specifically talking about EJB. Even that is from a perspective of the WebService. Actually the tutorial is all for web_service stuffs.
I am wondering the future of the EJB? Why do we spend time on what seems to be disappearing?
Please clarify, since my work touches very little EJB, but is heavily on XML/Servlets/SOAP.

[Vijay Gopalakrishnan]

EJB is a large topic to be covered in detail inside a tutorial for J2EE 1.4. Would you say EJB is important if Sun has inserted some 10 chapters from the EJB Tutorial inside this tutorial.
Also Sun has clearly named the chapter as 'New Features for EJB 2.1 Technology'. Did you ever see what is in this chapter? It begins with 'Beta Note: This chapter is intended for advanced developers who are already familiar with EJB technology. To learn the basics about EJB technology, see the 1.3 version of The J2EE Tutorial.'
Also read the 'Who Should Use This Tutorial' where you will find 'Note: With the exception of timer beans, Enterprise JavaBeans technology will be covered in the next release of the tutorial.'
With huge investments by Sun, IBM and other server providers as well as companies using EJB Technology for their applications, EJB is here to stay.
As far as multi-tier applications exist, EJB will remain as one of the prominently used middle-tier technologies.

[ June 14, 2003: Message edited by: Vijayakumar Gopalakrishnan ]
[ June 14, 2003: Message edited by: Vijayakumar Gopalakrishnan ]

[Al Newman]

I have to agree with Vijayakumar here. EJB remains a major part of the development mix, while I see little use of Web Services to this point.

[greg norman]

Of course, as a J2EE developer I do not want EJB goes away and would like to see its continuing progress.
However, if you compare the 2 J2EE tutorials, the 1.3 and the newer 1.4, you may find that Sun still keeps all the old chapters (Servlets, JSA, security,...) except those on EJBs, stressed significantly the web services. What does that mean to newcomers? Looks to me what suggested by Sun is obviuos. Poor Sun.
As for the IBM, the sell point of their new WebSphere 5 series is the web services. They also want people to use their WS 5 express, which has no support for EJB.
Since I got 2 vouchers (another is the IBM 484 J2EE 1.3), I will take the tests anyway.